


Growing Pains

by Nitzer



Series: hot mess [2]
Category: H.O.T. (Band)
Genre: Anal Sex, Awkward reunions, Disappointing Birthdays, Drinking, M/M, Reminiscing, Yearning, dreams (wet and otherwise), not talking about or acknowledging your feelings, references to "candy" era, running from your problems does not solve them, spending a lot of time apart and pretending you're totally fine with it, you cannot tear me away from the tragedy that is any disbandment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-09
Updated: 2021-03-11
Packaged: 2021-03-16 03:41:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29943936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nitzer/pseuds/Nitzer
Summary: The fall of an empire is not the end of the world. It is a lesson Woohyuk comes around to slowly.
Relationships: Ahn Chilhyun | Kangta/Jang Woohyuk
Series: hot mess [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1813612





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> title from super junior d&e song of the same name  
> i got kinda obsessed with whatever happened between same night but it's different and red light, green light, black out so i wrote it lol

For my twenty-third birthday, the group disbands. I know the two events are unrelated. But it’s an untreated wound in my heart for decades that they aligned so neatly. So we don’t really celebrate that year. And by the time I turn twenty-four, I’m deeply wrapped up in JTL. Chilhyun is out of my reach the same way the practice room I used to use in SM and the producer hyung I really liked working with are out of my reach now. In a kind of abstract way I haven’t had the time or energy to make concrete. So I don’t celebrate with him. A couple months before my twenty-fifth birthday things are different.

When H.O.T. disbands I essentially lose access to Chilhyun. I mean not entirely. Disbanding just changes our relationship so fundamentally he might as well be a whole new person. Not everything is lost. I still have his phone number. I have the address of an apartment I’m pretty sure is his. His mom still sends me a box of persimmons for the new year. I just rarely dial the number. And I haven’t been to the apartment. And I usually split up the box of persimmons between my staff members so that the box won’t sit there on my counter, staring at me accusingly for months.

But by 2002, he is a little bit closer. We’ve fixed the misunderstanding that broke up the group in the first place. But by the time we get around to that, there are new unspoken rifts between all of us. There are always things we don’t talk about. While Shinhwa worked out their problems by punching each other’s teeth out, we didn’t work out our problems at all. I can’t say which one was more dysfunctional but I can say who disbanded and who didn’t. We have strained phone conversations. We send each other clipped text messages. We see each other in person like twice a year (usually prompted by Jaewon because he is still our precious baby even if everything else is a mess).

There is no hole that Chilhyun leaves behind. Nothing distinguishable at least. I am entirely full with new responsibilities and fresh bitterness—overwhelmed even. He’s an indulgence I don’t have time for anyway. Then things slow down. And I have the time to process things (even if I consciously try _not_ to process everything that’s happened in the past few years). And Chilhyun starts appearing in my dreams. And even with distracting myself or just pure shutting off my brain as much as possible, I know what _that_ means.

The dreams aren’t all the same, most aren’t even similar. They all just star Chilhyun. In one, we’re in a bar and everything is warm browns and yellows. Chilhyun is sitting next to me, leaning over the bar, talking about something. I don’t hear his words, though, because he’s _right_ there. It’s Ahn Chilhyun and he’s right there. He looks young and inviting, his skin golden and his hair a honey brown. I don’t feel like I _can’t_ touch him but I do feel burdened and uncomfortable the same way I did when fans first started bringing presents to events. I _want_ to touch, though, that’s undeniable. He catches my eye and laughs, “Of course, you can touch.” He says it’s like it’s obvious, like there’s no other way it could be. Like he can _read_ my _mind_. So I reach out my hand and rest on his bicep, it’s warm and solid under my touch. He keeps talking but I can’t parse out the words anymore. I just enjoy the sound of his voice. I wake up feeling empty and unfulfilled.

Another is dark and neons. At first I think we’re at a club but then I realize, the neons are just reflections of the street outside. It’s a dark apartment, or room at least. And I’m already lying on top of Chilhyun. It’s hot and slick—my _whole_ body is hot and slick, desperately sweaty. My fingers are digging into Chilhyun’s skin and I’m _in_ him? At least, I think I’m in him, it’s too dark to really tell but I can’t find anything else to explain the wet, warm heat I’m rutting into. I kiss him because I can and my head is cloudy and I’m only chasing my own pleasure. There isn’t any of the apprehension I usually felt with him—always fearing someone would burst in and separate us. There’s nothing but heat and blind pleasure. And it’s closer to actually intimate, to actually _having sex_ , than we’ve ever been before but that is only a fleeting thought in my brain. Chilhyun keeps making that soft, broken sound he did the night we first kissed like a record skipping. I still cum to it though. I wake up sweaty and too-hot, wrapped up in sticky sheets. I think, at almost twenty-five, I am too old for wet dreams. (And at any age I was too…something to be having wet dreams about Ahn Chilhyun.)

There’s one that’s all clean white and pastels. The sunlight streams through my apartment window like a fucking mattress commercial. I’m tangled up in fresh white sheets and Chilhyun is sleeping next to me. He’s naked from the waist up, all smooth, flawless, golden skin laid out for me. I put my hand at his waist and trail it upwards, over his shoulder and he snores softly under me. It is something I don’t register as an indulgence—as a fantasy, as something I am not afforded in my everyday life—it just feels like any other morning. I curl into him and kiss the back of his neck tenderly. He shifts under me and mutters a sleepy “g’morning.” I wrap my arms around him and close my eyes until they feel sticky and heavy. And my heart and my arms feel so full for once. I feel contented in a new way I didn’t even know existed. Then I wake up for real. In the same apartment in my dreams, the same sun, the same sheets. Except my bed is empty. My body is drawn up around a pillow where Chilhyun used to be. I finally feel the absence in a real, concrete way while conscious. And I guess it’s the last straw.

It all comes to a fever pitch a little over a week before my birthday. I am thinking about Chilhyun endlessly— _obsessively_ , like one of those poor middle school girls that came to every one of our fansigns. It’s pathetic, really, sadder than those middle school girls probably. There’s no way that they came to the idea of Chilhyun nearly as much as I have. And I finally, clearly see what Lee Sooman was doing when he kept Chilhyun an arm’s length away from all of us, even his own members. Having him join later than the rest of us, barely training him at all before letting him out into the public eye. Always keeping him close the heart of the company, giving him special projects and special treatment. It made him a step above human even to us. It made us view him through the public’s eye before our own. And, for me specifically, it made him a pure, unfiltered _fantasy_. So my fantasies run wild.

I haven’t seen Chilhyun in months, leaving nothing real to build off of. I’m free to imagine anything. I imagine tearful reunions—melodramatic scenes, where he throws himself into my arms and we just hold each other, the kind of shit that belongs in the finale of a drama. I imagine going to some cozy restaurant with him, picking at comfort foods and talking about anything and laughing and laughing. I imagine him showing up to my apartment with chicken and beer and we both talk to each other quietly, intimately, almost in whispers that we still hear over the movie neither of us are paying attention to—a teenage fantasy we were always too busy to indulge in. The reunion comes in many idealized versions. But it always happens without warning on my birthday. And it’s always perfect.

I end up spending my birthday with my family mostly. But I go out late for drinks with Seungho and Jaewon. Heejun can’t make it. Neither can Chilhyun. It doesn’t surprise me but it does make me miserable, makes me take my birthday shots like I’m trying to drown something. Seungho makes some snide, passive aggressive remarks about Chilhyun and Heejun once he’s had a little too much to drink. And then he kind of comes to his senses and apologizes profusely before he starts the whole cycle again. I’m the birthday boy and I’d let it happen without the apologies but Seungho’s always been a far better person than me. Jaewon tries to keep things light, like always. Jaewon had always been a little bit like a dog or a cat, innately knowing when anyone was distressed or feeling down but never talking about it, only offering company, pretending like everything was business as usual. It was really the only kind of comfort I could accept. Sometimes I wonder if we even could’ve hoped for a better maknae.

The celebration—if you could call three grown men drinking together with like two plates of picked over bar snacks, everyone miserable and bitter, a _celebration_ —ends early. I make it back to my apartment before twelve which usually only happens when I’m stuck with the crew of some variety show, awkwardly trading fake compliments until I can escape. Never when I’m with Seungho and Jaewon, who I still miss in the wide, open, emptiness of my apartment on slow days. It’s not my worst birthday (I think we both know what takes _that_ title) but it’s definitely my most disappointing, unfulfilling, empty one.

It’s just after midnight and I’m sitting at my vanity, cleaning my face for the night. The lights are dim and soft because I do not want to confront the toll the years have taken on my face. I’m only twenty-five after all, only a quarter of a century, things shouldn’t have changed too much. And my phone buzzes. When I flip it open I see it’s Chilhyun and by then I am too close to him to play the charade that we are just former groupmates, to pretend that I haven’t been dreaming of him nonstop for weeks. _Happy birthday_ , he wishes. Even though it’s just after midnight, it’s still technically the next day and he’s still technically a day late. I am an afterthought again. I am not the first priority to him but maybe it’s foolish to ever hope that I would be.

I still respond. I know I am not truly wanted, not wholly or unconditionally at least, but I still eat up the crumbs. We exchange some clipped small talk about our careers, he tells me about Heejun and I tell him about Seungho and Jaewon. This is everything I ever wanted. He’s returned to me for my birthday after months and months of nothing, of not even wanting him. He’s here. But it’s hollow and hardly a victory. And all the hope that swelled in my heart, all the longing and yearning, leaks out like a deflating balloon. There is a lull in the conversation and I just close my phone and go to bed. There’s no salvaging a fantasy that had no place in reality anyway. And when I finally fall asleep, I don’t dream.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'll be real with you i've never listened to jtl and only heard kangta's more recent solo stuff ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯  
> also i may be a whore for SM but they are still the devil

There are unread messages left on my phone when I wake up. It is an unusual phenomenon, especially when I’m on break. They’re all from Chilhyun and I feel my heart thaw or tingle or something else warm that I should not give into this easily. The first one comes just ten minutes or so after I went to bed, _sorry, I’m not good at this_. He admits and it sounds sheepish and shy. _Maybe we should do this in person?_ He offers and I can almost imagine the nervousness that plagued him, waiting for a response that didn’t come. _Well…you must be asleep, good night_ , is the last one and it comes a half hour after the others.

It’s so… _small_ and unconfident. I’m almost convinced that I saved the wrong contact info under “Chilhyun.” This nervous kid can’t be Ahn Chilhyun, k-pop golden child, ruler of the world. But that doesn’t stop me from responding and setting up a dinner for us. I’m more than familiar with the empty, aching pain of realizing that it’s only been a dream at this point. I let Chilhyun pick the place, he’s treating me after all. And I wait with bated breath for everything I ever wanted.

The place Chilhyun chooses is a cozy Japanese-style bar. It’s intimate booths made of dark wood, lit up by warm, yellow lights. It still feels like a dream but I honestly might’ve been here before, with the whole group and just never bothered to remember it. Maybe it somehow inspired my dreams but I know it’s burned into my memory now. Chilhyun’s already seated at a booth waiting for me. _Waiting_ for _me_. His hair is dark again, long in a way I’m not accustomed to. I can only see a sliver of his face from the doorway but it already seems different. I guess everything is different though.

When he sees me his face lights up and he pulls me into a quick, terse hug. “Woohyuk, happy birthday!” He greets. It’s warm but tight and awkward.

“It’s been a long time.” I greet back, still half in the hug, still far too close to him. But I don’t have the words to truly express how long it feels like it’s been, staring down a Chilhyun I barely recognize at all. The angles on his face used to be ethereal, beyond beautiful, stunning—in the true sense of the word, a kind of striking that left you rooted in place and breathless. But they’ve shifted in some intangible way to sit awkwardly on his face. So his jaw looks too strong or his cheeks too high, I can’t really tell. And there’s a small, nervousness to him. Something unthinkable for Kangta, conqueror of worlds, ruler of the whole budding industry. But there it is, plainly evident in the hunch of his shoulders and the hesitant way his eyes meet mine.

“Yeah,” he agrees in one, quiet breath, “but you’ve been so busy.” He offers as an explanation or an excuse, sinking into his chair.

“And you’ve been so busy too.” I offer almost reflexively. Because Chilhyun had always been squarely in charge of how, when and where we interacted. I couldn’t wrap my head around a world where I held the reigns, even if only for one day, even if it was just my own birthday.

And for one, painfully long second, we’re both sitting in silence, realizing that being “very busy” no longer means spending every waking second (and most unconscious seconds too) together but being so far from each other that I have trouble recognizing him.

“I mean, we should probably order before we catch up.” He laughs awkwardly, gesturing at the menu.

I let Chilhyun order for me because my brain is only partially functioning, staring everything I ever desired in the face and still barely being able to recognize him.

“I’ve heard you guys on the radio.” He tells me once the waiter is gone, sliding the menu neatly to the center of the table.

“I’ve heard you too.” I respond automatically. It’s a reflex, like saying “thank you” to a compliment but it’s a lie. I mean, I’ve _heard_ Chilhyun’s solo music but I’ve tried really hard not to listen. I haven’t gotten around to reconciling Kangta as a separate entity outside of HOT—outside of _us_ —yet. So I turn the station when he comes on and look away when he shows up on a rerun of a music show playing on the TV of our beauty salon. I know he’s out there, I hear the way Hyesung made fun of Chilhyun through Seungho or whoever. But, like the sun or any other cosmically bright and important object, I don’t look directly at it.

“I like the stuff you’re doing.” He compliments stiffly. “I don’t know if I’ve had the chance to tell you before, but I really like it.” He adds on hurriedly.

And I want so bad to return the compliment with something specific and sincere about Chilhyun’s music but I _can’t_. And I can’t even tell him why. There is one thing I know about Chilhyun’s music, though, he hasn’t done anything with Heejun yet. I had heard Heejun’s solo stuff, could listen to it just fine (I’d like to tell myself that I didn’t know what the difference was, why Heejun’s solo music didn’t leave my skin crawling but I know why…we _all_ know why) and it was devoid of Chilhyun. It surprised me that SM didn’t try to milk the last of the HOT fame out of their remaining members. “I’m surprised you and Heejun aren’t doing something together.”

He shrugs in this closed-off, guarded way that tells me nothing. “Well, you know, Heejun wanted to do the band thing and the company has enough new, idols to play with.”

“They have a new group already?” I knew SM were milking Shinhwa still and had Boa under their thumb now but neither of them were _new_ _groups_.

“Yeah, TVXQ already debuted and everything.” He laughs off.

I’d heard of TVXQ but I didn’t really follow them (I didn’t consider any idols my ‘rivals’ anymore) and never put together that they were SM kids. “Oh.” I offer intelligently. Three years ago, a future after HOT was unthinkable. For myself. For the other members. For the Korean entertainment industry. For the whole fucking world. We _were_ the future. The past, the present, the _everything_. But in three years, HOT ended and not much else ended with it. We were all still alive and well, had thriving careers even. The company that made us was still standing, still fucking debuting new groups. The kids that got in fist fights over us had grown up or moved onto the next big thing. The earth kept turning.

“There’s only five of them, I think six was too much for the company to handle at once.” He jokes lightly, making to elbow me over the table but he can’t quite reach.

And before I can even try to think of a response, the waiter shows back up with our first round of drinks and I think about how I’ve never wanted to drown something out so bad in my entire life.

If there is a post-HOT world—and that is still a pretty resounding _if_ to me—then it’s clear to me that Kangta is not the top of it. He’s overlooked and ignored, no longer the golden child of the company. Boa does better in Japan and TVXQ does better with the kids. He’s not the guaranteed cash cow he once was. He doesn’t sound bitter. He doesn’t outwardly complain, he hides all the things I pick up on in vague double-meanings. But it’s still clear to me that the company didn’t keep him because they wanted him, they just didn’t want anyone _else_ to have him. If they could keep just one of us, they could truly end the legacy of HOT. And that sounds exactly like the kind of sneaky, back-stabbing company that made all of us suspicious of the innocuous difference in the length of contracts between some of us.

But I really shouldn’t be learning anything because I have truly _drowned_ myself in everything the waiter handed me. It started with a round of sake bombs Chilhyun ordered even though I _insisted_ they were tacky and in bad taste. Then maybe just some regular beer (some fancy Japanese beer? I don’t know) and I feel like I remember something sweet and fruity but I guess it’s just a dream and then I move into pure soju and stay there. And drown myself in it. The drinks smooth things out between us. Chilhyun is still everything I ever wanted but he’s also a real, tangible person. He’s not the company’s golden little angel either. It makes me feel like we’re on even footing almost.

Chilhyun’s reminiscing about “Hope” and how well it did and how much everyone loved it and he was like a thin, thin thread away from just singing it in our booth at the bar. “We should go to karaoke.” I tell him, half because I really want to and half because I don’t want him to turn this cozy little bar into a karaoke bar all on his own.

“We should probably go somewhere else if you wanna keep drinking anyway.” He laughs at me, clearing the empty bottles away from the middle of the table so he can lean on his arms and still look at me.

“Are you cutting me off?” I tease, holding my half-empty bottle protectively.

“You’re the birthday boy.” He scoffs. “I would never.”

“Well then,” I appraise, “you catch up.” I tell him, pouring another shot.

He knocks it back with a grimace. “Why are you even drinking soju at a Japanese bar?”

“Why’d they put it on the menu if I wasn’t supposed to order it?” I shoot back with a stupid grin.

He shoots me back an equally as stupid grin, lopsided and easygoing—familiar, a relic of the kid who ruled the world. “Fine, whatever you want.” There’s a quiet, simmering heat behind his words and I feel the room close in on us. It’s not the cramped living room of our shared dorms this time but the feeling is identical.

I reach my hand limply out to the middle of the table—pure instincts, no thought, I just want to touch.

He pushes his empty glass into my waiting hand so our skin meets for just a second. “So do you wanna stay here or what?” He offers. And I dumbly wonder if it will feel like this every time.

Chilhyun is unusually talkative in the taxi—a kind of nervous overexcited. Because I remember watching Kangta in public with strangers how he said little and left a big impact, something the company taught all of us to upkeep our fragile image. But words just spill thoughtlessly from his mouth in the cramped space even though the driver doesn’t seem particularly interested.

I keep my eyes on Chilhyun’s profile and my mouth shut—stunned and tongue-tied like I’ve always been, like nothing has changed at all. But there’s something entirely unfamiliar about this bright, raging fire inside Chilhyun, something too uncontrolled to ever be allowed to exist in HOT.

“Should I wait for you to walk him up?” Our driver asks us as he pulls up to my apartment building.

“No,” Chilhyun answers, flashing him an overeager smile, “I drank too much so he’s letting me stay the night.” He laughs. “Isn’t he the best?”

The last remaining sober part of my brain is _horrified_. With my bleached hair and Chilhyun’s unmistakable face and both of our designer leisurewear there’s no fucking way we could pass for ordinary old high school buddies meeting up for a night of drinking. And if the driver was just politely averting his eyes before, this was certainly juicy enough to get his attention. Two former-HOT members spending the night together? We might as well just write the fanfiction ourselves at that point.

But he just turns to us lazily and tells Chilhyun the total amount for the trip firmly. And two former-HOT members without even a sad attempt at a disguise successfully sneak off into the night with no attention paid to us at all. The driver likely never even recognized either of us. It’s something I could never imagine happening but I guess this is a world I could never imagine existing either. Everything is uncharted territory.

I am stupidly nervous for Chilhyun to see my apartment—to be alone with him, really—and I fumble with my own passcode, tripping over the doorframe. I try to blame it on the drinks. We both huddle together in the entryway, sloppily trying to get our shoes off. And it’s a small entryway, he might as well be holding me up with how close he is. And with him hunched over, trying to reach one of his sneakers he’s somehow shorter than me and he looks up at me from under his eyelashes coyly like he only ever learned one way of being sexy. And his eyes glint in the dim lighting and his heat almost suffocates me in the small space and I want to order fried chicken and talk about our lives and everything until the sun rises but I also want to strip him and press every inch of our bare skin together and my mind is too muddled to really choose.

“I really missed you, y’know?” He tells me, licking his lips so they glisten.

And I guess the choice is made for me.

I kiss him desperate and hungry. I kiss him with all the lonely emptiness that ate away at my heart over the years. I kiss him like I’m moments away from waking up alone and unfulfilled again. I kiss him like he’s _real_.

And, god, he _is_ real. His hands braced against the wall on either side of me to keep his balance. One foot still in the air. Japanese beer still drowning out any other taste in his mouth. It’d be a pretty shit fantasy. Luckily it’s all painfully, painfully real. We’re not the same kids that experimented in our crammed dorms, dancing between managers and schedules and the other members. There’s something _weightier_ to this. The idea that it’s likely not by chance. The hard truth that this is on purpose. But otherwise we are still needy, fucked up kids kissing in a too small space.

He stumbles backwards, the sound of his sneaker slapping against the tile like a gunshot in the still quiet. And we’re still stuck in the entryway of my apartment like there’s anything to hide in an empty house. In the dim lighting, I lose all the new lines on Chilhyun’s face but somehow he still doesn’t look like the kid I left behind in HOT. He’s still something new with newly spit-slicked lips and softer eyes. “Well,” I start, “what are you waiting for?”

He just laughs at me, throwing his arms around my neck and backing me into the living room. “I don’t mind waiting, you’re always the one rushing things.”

“So, we’re gonna play by _your_ rules on _my_ birthday?” I tease.

“It’s not even your birthday anymore!” He argues playfully, nearly tripping over the couch.

And I know, with the way that my apartment is laid out, that this is taking us straight to my bed. I _know_. But watching Chilhyun fall into my bed feels like a dream. It feels like all the alcohol I drank that night hit me again all at once. (I don’t want to say that I’m drunk on Chilhyun because that’s just dumb but it’s entirely possible that I am.) I don’t know what to do with my hands anymore and I’m having trouble thinking. _I dreamt of you, like a lot recently, like all the time_ , keeps swirling around my brain, getting jumbled up and then starting over again. I’m not sure if it stays in my head or leaks out of my mouth but Chilhyun just smiles up at me fondly like I’ve done something stupid and endearing (which could be anything at this point).

“So, kiss me.”

So I do, planting my elbows on the bed and trying to shove my hands up his shirt. It’s one of those obscenely-tight, nearly suctioned to his body kind of shirts though and I don’t have the coordination to try to peel it off. “Why’d you wear such tight shit?” I complain, muffled against his skin.

“It’s not the 90’s anymore.” He snorts. “What’d you want? Our old stage outfits?”

I don’t. Mostly because the outfits were hideous and outdated and, at this point, funny enough to truly ruin the mood. But also because I don’t want to be the same kid I was in HOT anymore. And this Chilhyun here is real. He’s not the same kid he was in HOT either. He’s not the 18-year-old version of him I recreate every time I fall asleep. His face is softer and his body is more muscled. It’s clear even with my hands still on the outside of his shirt. The world has moved on even if I wasn’t watching the whole time. It’s not the 90’s anymore. But that doesn’t mean that reality is a consolation prize. “You’re gonna ruin the mood.” I complain weakly, still fumbling with his shirt.

His expression softens when he looks at me. “Here,” he offers, slipping his hands under mine, “lemme help.”

And it’s a kind of closeness, a kind of gentleness that I never thought I could get from Chilhyun. And I never want to let go of it. So I follow his hands up, over the soft skin of sharp hipbones and the trail of coarse hair, peeling the too-tight shirt off of him. And it doesn’t seem nearly as hard anymore with his hands in mine. I don’t stop to look. I know his body isn’t pretty for me. And I also know that I would be just as starved and desperate to get my skin against his, to get my hands on his body, regardless of the state it was in. It was always about Chilhyun when I got this close, Kangta left behind in the bright lights and the imaginations of the public.

With my mouth back on his, he drags my hands back down his bare chest towards his pants. And the feeling of my hands trapped between the heated, silky skin of his torso and the slick, commanding force of his fingers intertwined in mine is hot and heavenly—intimate in a way I can only enjoy if I don’t think about it. He keeps his hands resting over mine but untwines our fingers once we’ve reached the waistband of his jeans. And _that’s_ the Chilhyun I remember. Dangling the prize in my face but still making me reach for it. It’s easy to find the button and pop it, though, like my coordination has finally returned.

After I've peeled his stupid tight little pants off his body, Chilhyun keeps parting his thighs wider and wider underneath me. All I do is slide into that perfect little V he makes for me until I can't even dream of anything better. But he keeps spreading his legs even after I've caved and stuck my hand down his boxers, stroking his cock loosely. Somehow he still seems fidgety and insistent.

"More." He finally pants out.

"More what?" I murmur. "What _more_ could you possibly want?"

He manages to wiggle out of his boxers too. "Lower." He goads, lifting his ass up off the bed.

And my head fucking _swims_. There's no way. There's no fucking way Ahn Chilhyun is asking me to fuck him. Not even for my birthday.

"Are you having trouble following?" He scoffs but I can hear the nervousness in his voice, feel the tremor in his thighs. He's not sure I want this.

I don't answer. I just take my free hand and circle the tip of my finger around his rim.

He lets out a shaky, fluttering breath. "You have lube right?"

"Of course I have lube." I tell him like it’s a stupid question. But _I_ don't even know why I have lube, an impulse buy when I was drunk and lonely I’m sure. I haven't even gotten the chance to use it on anyone but myself. But it would all be worth it if I got my fingers inside Chilhyun.

The slick, wet, sloppy noise of getting the lube onto my fingers and then onto him is awkward and weird. I can make out his strained expression even in the low lighting.

"Is this my birthday present?" I ask, almost as a joke.

"How could it be _your_ present when _I’m_ enjoying it so much?" He teases back. He looks like the same kid with the whole world in his hands. He looks like he owns everything. He looks like the untouchable fantasy I first thought I was getting my hands on years ago.

My hands slips forward with no grace or finesse at the remark. And no matter how hard I try to reign myself in and pretend I’m experienced, pretend that this isn’t the first time for me, there’s no way that Chilhyun doesn’t know.

Every time I touch a dick that isn’t mine for the rest of my fucking life it will either be Chilhyun’s or a replacement for Chilhyun’s. You don’t get a bite of forbidden fruit and then downgrade to apples. You just don’t. And there’s no way that Chilhyun doesn’t know that. He could offer himself up on a silver platter as my present for every occasion for the rest of my life and it would still be the best present I’ve ever gotten every fucking time. But if he wants to pretend that this is just as much for him as it is for me, I won’t stop him.

With three fingers buried in him, Chilhyun starts to get restless. He squirms on the bed and tries to force himself down on me. “You’re not gonna break me.” He hisses.

But he’s so fucking tight around my fingers. And so fucking hot to the touch. I’m truly afraid to give him more, to go faster.

“You’ve seen me go through _everything_ , you know when I’ll break.” He goads me. “Get in, Woohyukie.” There’s a brightness, a welcoming smile to what he’s saying. And it’s like getting sidetracked on the way to the van after a concert, like being the last one to trail into our hotel room, like wanting to practice the new choreo longer than anyone else. It’s like we’re both teenagers all over again and I’ve never gotten a taste of him. We’re both just kids and I don’t have anything that I will have to carry around for the rest of my life burned into me yet.

And when I lean down to crash our lips together it’s like I’m watching every Chilhyun I’ve ever known—Kangta included—coalesce into one in real time. There’s the kid who owns the world, the one favored by Lee Sooman himself. There’s the self-assured eighteen-year-old who only did aegyo for the fans when there were less than a hundred in the audience and he knew it wouldn’t ruin his image. There’s the imp that begged me to tease him until he sobbed and the messy, heaven-sent gift that did lay under me, letting me do whatever I wanted until he _sobbed_. There’s this awkward, in-between twenty-something learning to be humble and be rejected and picked over and not the center of everything. It’s all there. All of it’s always been there. And I’m probably the only one that’s ever seen all of it.

I’m probably the only one that’s ever seen all of it.

It’s all I can think of as I sink into him. And I have to wonder what really falling in love feels like. If it’s like this maybe.

And when I finally slide into him it’s not the tight heat of him that grabs my attention. It’s the way his arms snake around me, both of his hands pressing burning, needy, affectionate prints into my back. I don’t know if I’ll ever be this close to him again. If I will ever love feeling so wanted ever again. But I have a quiet, sneaking suspicion that it’s all just Chilhyun. That it’ll always just be him.

“You’re…everything, you know?” My everything. Everything I’ve ever wanted. Everything I’ve ever needed. Everything for eternity.

I don’t know if he understands what it means. If it even comes out of my mouth in the right order. But it’s out there at least. Whatever he takes from it. But the feeling of his fingers digging even harder into my shoulders, trying desperately to pull us even the slightest bit closer, is the only answer I need.

It doesn’t take him long to start meeting my thrusts, hips moving impatiently against mine. I want to say something smooth and romantic, something that implies that I’ll take care of him and all he has to do is lay back and look pretty. But I can’t get my mouth to do anything but make pitiful little, reverent noises like a desperately turned on worshipper. Chilhyun keeps making these short, hiccupping little whines with every thrust and it is endearing and sweet so… _unpracticed_.

I do not let myself wonder if this is Chilhyun’s first time because that will only lead to disaster. (But, quietly, secretly, to myself, I pretend it is.) He gets more desperate and frantic under me, his nails running roughly over my skin and every muscle in his body straining towards something but too unfocused to actually get there. “Please,” he begs and I cannot even begin to fathom what he wants. “Please, just let me…” He trails off, vague and desperate.

“I’ll let you.” I assure him. “I’ll let you do anything, baby.” And I shove a clumsy hand between our bodies to fit around his cock.

“Yes.” He hisses and even in the dim lighting I can see the way his muscles strain against the skin of his neck.

“Ah, there you go.” I coo. “There you are.” It is not the practiced, slinky submissive nature that I had from him before and it feels inappropriate to be coddling him like this. But it slips out of my mouth without thinking. Chilhyun will always be a precious, fleeting present even when with bared teeth, threatening to tear me apart.

Instead he falls apart, holding himself rigid with a surprised gasp and then a relieved groan, melting into me easily. I cum with some embarrassing noise and no fanfare. And we both just lay there, slick and sticky, hearts hammering against each other like that expensive surround sound system Heejun was really proud of.

It’s the first time there’s ever really been an afterglow with Chilhyun. Before it was always rushing to pull our pants back up, to get out of the shower before anyone noticed, to arrange the beds to look like all we did was sleep in them. But there’s no prying eyes. There’s no pressing schedules. There’s no Jaewon banging on the door to the bathroom because he’s gotta piss and there’s only one bathroom in the whole dorm. It is just the sound of my breathing and his breathing and Seoul city traffic.

I prop myself up on my elbow just to look at him. He’s flushed and sweaty, his hair a mess against my pillows. There’s something about him that’s…almost peaceful, though. The creases in his face have eased up, the tension between his brows completely wiped out. I don’t want to break the moment so I just brush some sweaty hair away from his face and he finally lets his eyes drift open. “What?” He asks, his voice a hoarse whisper.

“Nothing.” I answer, not taking my hands off of him. “That was just the best present you ever got me.”

He scoffs. “I told you that wasn’t your present.”

I finally roll off of him, only to curl up next to him, our foreheads barely touching. “Then what _is_ my present?”

He opts to look at his hands while he’s talking. “Don’t be so impatient, it’ll show up soon.”

“You didn’t bring it?”

“No,” he mutters, small and unlike him, “I got it shipped here. I didn’t know if you’d wanna actually see me.”

And the whole idea that I could ever reject Ahn Chilhyun is so fucking ridiculous that I almost start laughing. “I’d never say no to you.”

“So, you’ll let me stay the night?” It is almost sheepish, the way it comes out of his mouth. I’d like to say that “coquettish” is not a look that suits Chilhyun but I’d be lying.

“Yeah,” I laugh. “But we should probably shower first.”

Showering with Chilhyun is a slow and languid affair. I can keep my hands on him as long as I want. And he seems perfectly content to melt under my touch and wash right down the drain. “It’s nice to not be in a rush.” I tell him, my hands running shampoo through his hair.

“Yeah,” he laughs, “well, we have all the time in the world now.” The way it comes out of his mouth, it does not sound like a warm invitation. It sounds like a prison sentence.

Of course we have all the time in the world when there is nothing waiting for us anymore. We entered retirement at the ripe old age of twenty or twenty one and it’s all downhill from here. Irrelevant and past our peak, we’re just biding our time now. We could fuck around all we wanted without any eyes on us. And, I think, it must feel like purgatory for such a bright star like Kangta to be kept locked up just so no one else could have him.

I wrap one arm tightly around his chest, pulling him back into me and press a tender kiss to his shoulder. It’s an apology, a promise of something better, anything I can offer.

Chilhyun slides into a pair of my old boxers as easily as he slides into the empty side of my bed. It is just like every one of my dreams of him. He is soft and warm and pliant, letting me curl around him and hold on tight without fuss. And I fully expect to wake up and find out none of this was real. He never came home with me. We never even had dinner. He didn’t text me on my birthday. Maybe even his whole existence was just a sweet dream.


	3. Chapter 3

When I wake up Chilhyun is still real. The whole thing is still real. Even the faded lettering on the shirt I got in some swag bag from an event I barely remember is exactly how I remember it. Nothing disappeared with the sunrise.

He’s got stray rays of sunlight all over his skin and is looking up at me curiously. I wouldn’t exactly call it a “mattress commercial,” it’s too specific to me. I don’t know how well it would rate with the masses but if I was ever looking at the sky to catch a shooting star I would think, _I wish for Chilhyun to be here in the morning_. “You stayed the night.” I remark, the awe audible even to myself.

He laughs softly. “I’ve tried hailing a cab before dawn before, not really my thing.” I don’t like the implications. But I can’t pretend I’ve been faithful to Chilhyun all these years—that I even thought there was something there that _required_ faithfulness. Playing between the lines, in the spaces between words didn’t really allow for jealousy. “You sleep sounder now.”

The statement blindsides me. I can’t tell if he means that I sleep sounder in my own apartment than I did in the dorms. Or if he means I sleep sounder with him around than when I’m alone. But I have no fucking idea how he’d know what I sleep like when I’m alone. I don’t even know that. It seems like a foregone conclusion, though, that I’d sleep easier with Chilhyun here.

“I should get you breakfast, at least,” I tell him, propping myself up to a semi-sitting position, “for staying past sunrise.”

He snorts. “I already tried that. How do you live with a kitchen that empty? Never bothered with cooking?”

It’s probably as hard for Chilhyun to imagine me cooking as it is for me to imagine him cooking. When we were both at the dorms there was never enough time to figure out who was the best at cooking. There was never time for anything more than snacks from the convenience store or barely-done instant ramen. “I actually was supposed to go grocery shopping today.” Which must be an even bigger shock. Even going to the convenience store on the corner was a nightmare when were still in HOT.

“Well, sorry for crashing your plans.” He laughs, swinging his legs off the bed and flinging the comforter towards me.

I manage to at least get Chilhyun a cup of coffee and some toast with jam after really digging through my kitchen.

“So…” I trail off, the connection is stilted—that easy, electric feeling only coming in spurts and bursts. “How are the new boy group?”

He takes a long sip of coffee and tilts his head to think. “Would you believe me if I said they reminded me of us?”

I wouldn’t. Because there never could be another HOT. The times change so quickly. No one could rule the world like us with new groups flooding in faster than the public can keep up with them. No one could be Jaewon’s cuteness, Seungho’s warmth, Heejun’s talent, Chilhyun’s charm. No one could ever compete. But I would believe it too. SM has never let success slip through their fingers without a fight. After losing us, the first thing I figured they would do would be to make a new version. They wouldn’t admit to _loss_. They’d just move on to something bigger and better. “Are they?” I answer, neutrally.

“No.” He laughs. “They remind me more of Heejun, his newer stuff. I guess the whole company is going in the same direction.” He shrugs.

But what was Heejun’s new stuff, his solo stuff if not an undeniable piece of HOT? What was “Warrior’s Descent” or “Outside Castle” or any other quasi-rock song we released if not a direct reflection of Heejun? It was hard to draw concrete lines when we’d only been apart a fraction of the time we spent together. “Not you though?”

He shook his head. “I’m more made for ballads.”

But I’d seen Chilhyun on TV with short, cropped hair and leather vests and all-black outfits like he was trying to be Heejun too. The world kept spinning even if he wouldn’t acknowledge it. Even if I wouldn’t acknowledge it. We all kept going. It’s not over for Chilhyun. Or me. Or anyone of us. At least…not yet. “Do you wanna come grocery shopping with me?” I offer.

He smiles warmly, naturally. “I’m actually supposed to be at the office today.” He laughs.

And it is so beautiful. So unbelievable. So domestic. Such a fantasy. We are a married couple eating an early breakfast before work. Chilhyun will go to work and I will run errands and cook dinner for him in the evening and when he comes back home we can do this all over again. It will be everything I ever wanted—Chilhyun always by my side with no fear of him ever leaving again.

But I can’t. Things aren’t over for Chilhyun. Or me. Or our careers. We have a public to face, music to make, scandals to get into and out of. Images to reinvent. And if I try to dig my fingers into this and hold on—to Chilhyun, this moment, this experience, the best birthday present I’ll probably ever get—I’ll only leave marks in the tender flesh of it all. Like trying to catch ladybugs when I was younger, all I will manage to do is destroy this if I capture it.

So, I let go instead.

It’ll come back to me if it’s meant to.

“Do you wanna borrow some clothes?”

“You _know_ I’m too tall to be sharing clothes with you.” He laughs. “Just get me a cab, will you?”

And I do. And we have an easy-going kind of conversation I never imagined possible over my tiny, kitchen table, the sun managing to keep our drinks warm until we empty them. Even when the cab finally gets here it’s not over.

I crowd him in the doorway again, shoes half-on and kiss him and wrap my arms around him. It isn’t “goodbye,” it’s just “I’ll see you another time.” Because nothing is over yet. Even when he shuts my door behind him with a blinding smile and one last “happy birthday” it’s not over.

The world keeps spinning and I try to catch up to the present for once.

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr](angelinmyheartt.tumblr.com) [cc](https://curiouscat.me/Nitzer)


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